In this series, we’ll look deeper into some of the projects on Behance.net that were especially admired in our community. Peter Stults creates movie posters reimagined for another time and place - like, what would the “Spring Breakers” poster look like if it starred James Dean? Although when Stults first released his work to his personal networks, the response was “like crickets in an awkward silence,” he became an overnight sensation on Behance, going completely viral. He was even recently commissioned to create a movie poster for an upcoming Paul Schrader (of Taxi Driver) movie. 

What was your inspiration for this project?
Since 1999 I’ve been playing with the idea of “what-if” oriented concepts. It first started with making movie posters for books I was reading. Then I was doing posters based on concepts – like what if you had Brad Pitt and Keanu Reeves in some religious thriller? The next step in evolution was making posters for movies featuring a star who was going to be cast, but didn’t get up getting the role. For example, Jack Nicholson as the father in “A Christmas Story” or Tom Cruise as Iron Man. Friends of mine later forwarded me the work of Sean Hartter who crafted the “different era” concept, which greatly inspired my What-if poster making process.

Can you describe your process in creating this project?
Much of it is brainstorming. I’ll be on the subway or walking around, and I first think of a movie, then think of the setting and genre, then the actors. Once I’ve got the concept, I loosely sketch out the poster’s style, thinking about things like horizontal or vertical orientation (depends on the Era). Once sketched out, I look for photographs and images of the actors. I have a collection of pulp fiction books and old magazines and newspapers that I use to derive texture, aged effects and reviewing color spectrum and type face. Most of my posters will start in Photoshop, but I incorporate Illustrator, scanning things in, and even hand-drawing some parts.

Did you expect it to be as popular as it’s been on The Behance Network?
I was absolutely not at all ready for the popularity. I had first passed some of these posters around on Flickr and Facebook and it was the equivalent of crickets in an awkward silence situation. I remember being super proud of my Avatar, Fifth Element and Inception posters, but barely got any “likes.” So, when creating my Behance profile, I did not think anything of them. I was crossing fingers my illustration-based work would get some traction.

Did anything interesting happen as a result of the success of this project? (fans contacting you, job opportunities, blogs picking it up, etc).
When the posters went viral, a whole wave of things took place. The famous fashion store Colette, based in Paris, France, contacted me about doing a show on the posters. I had never done an art show before, so my first show being an international one at a well-known fashion store was not too bad.

Then, I was contacted to create the promotional poster for the upcoming movie “The Canyons,” which is directed by Paul Schrader (writer of Taxi Driver and Raging Bull), screenplay by Bret Easton Ellis (author of American Psycho and Less Than Zero) and starring Lindsay Lohan and adult entertainment star James Deen. So, my first professional movie poster offering being “The Canyons” was pretty phenomenal.

There has been a wave of freelance work I’ve been a part of that have resulted in some cool projects. I’ve been covered in various blogs and online news sources (Huffington Post, Elle, Slate, Premiere, Fast Company, Business Insider, Yahoo Movies, BuzzFeed, Daily What, Flavorpill, Paste Magazine, Laughing Squid and many more). And the results haven’t slowed. I do a “What If” poster each month for the French movie magazine “So Film.” I’m working on a show in England right now and recently I got contacted by a gallery owner in Brooklyn, all for the “What If” posters.

Read more →

In this series, we’ll look deeper into some of the projects on Behance.net that were especially admired in our community. Fred Nerby designed a Facebook redesign concept that has absolutely exploded on the web – over 300,000 views, 15,000 appreciations and counting! He streamlined the experience, adding responsive panels, splitting the News Feed into two columns, for example. Take a deeper look into how this was created below!

What was your inspiration for this project?
As funny as it may sound, the project was not actually inspired by visuals or UI work created by other platforms, but more so a deeper understanding and a personal interest in user behavior. For a while I’ve been researching Systematic Design and what it actually represents and how it’s best applied in the digital space because it’s changed the making of media in the modern world and also how digital agencies are now working.

Understanding behavior and the psychological success behind a platform such as Facebook is crucial before you get in to the creation or execution of design. People around the world are already connected on a personal level with the platform (or the brand that is Facebook) for many different reasons; main factor is that it’s fulfilling a need in people that wasn’t there a few years ago. If you understand the power of systematic thinking then there are ways of drawing that emotional connection out of people with clever design that will make the experience even more powerful and engaging for the user; and that is where it all started.

Can you describe your process in creating this project?
First off, when dealing with a platform such as Facebook, which is heavily focused on a suite of behaviors you need to get an understanding of how to actually design for that. The process of thinking is very different from how people have worked in the past at more traditional agencies. It’s important to understand that most traditional agencies are coming from a pure narrative space where the idea is to interrupt you to think of a brand you haven’t thought about and connect you through a story. Their greatest challenge in the modern world of media right now is to recognize that you can be creative within “Systematic Design”.

For example, the world is embracing the products and media invented in places such as the Silicon Valley (Apple) and the innovation that has been driving such places forward is NOT the innovation of narrative, it’s the innovation and more importantly the understanding of systems and behavior. And today; that has become a creative discipline! Companies like Apple and Facebook are focusing on creating platforms and it’s a new world where you “invent media to frame behavior”, which in itself means that the production is now creative and your relationship with the “making” is very different. If you want your UI to be successful you need to have a solid understanding of all this before you move on to architecture and design when taking on a platform.

All in all, the setup was thought through before I got into the making of design so the overall process of creating the artwork went fairly smooth with a few minor hick-­‐ ups on the way. Again, you can’t jump straight in to a design of such a project without understanding the user behavior and then try to figure things out as you go along. That will never work!

Read more →